"While our guests were there, he opened the fridge and said, "I have some beer in there, but it's been there a few months--I don't know if it's still good.""

I'm not sure I'd put this in a thread about what every adult should know. I don't drink beer and I must admit I never really thought about how long it would take to expire. Coupled with commercials I've seen where an expiration date on a beer is an advertising point, I'd have to say that his comment isn't far enough away from common sense that he should be derided for it. In fact, I still don't know if you're commenting on his statement because beer doesn't expire, or because it's virtually certain to have expired in a few months.

Dazi wrote:

"Welch's used to make one, but I don't know if they still do...same with Martinelli's."

We get Martinelli's sparkling cider all the time. It's available in most grocery stores in the northeastern U.S. at least.

My now-DH and I invited a coworker & her boyfriend over for dinner, or dessert, or something. DH was living in his parents' old home in a VERY bachelor existence; he went to their new home for dinner nearly every night.

While our guests were there, he opened the fridge and said, "I have some beer in there, but it's been there a few months--I don't know if it's still good."

Certainly they don't expire in 3 or 4 months (which was all the older that beer was)--that's the whole point of canning things.

That's the part that was sort of unusual for someone not to know.

(We all know or don't know some stuff.)

Spoken (written) like a non-beer drinker!Beer can become "skunked" after several months. It most certainly does not maintain a fresh flavor for years. 2-4 months, probably ok, 8-10 months its going to have an off flavor. You can still drink it, and some people won't mind, but it won't be "good" (as in pleasant) anymore.

Two things about this are that beverages aren't usually considered "canned foods" and you didn't mention cans in your post so I assumed bottles. Again I double back to the commercial advertising expiration dates on beer and talking about how the brand will help you avoid "skunky" beer, and non-beer-drinking me can easily interpret that to mean that beer has a specific shelf life that's short enough that it would be reasonable to mark it on the container.

My now-DH and I invited a coworker & her boyfriend over for dinner, or dessert, or something. DH was living in his parents' old home in a VERY bachelor existence; he went to their new home for dinner nearly every night.

While our guests were there, he opened the fridge and said, "I have some beer in there, but it's been there a few months--I don't know if it's still good."

Certainly they don't expire in 3 or 4 months (which was all the older that beer was)--that's the whole point of canning things.

That's the part that was sort of unusual for someone not to know.

(We all know or don't know some stuff.)

Spoken (written) like a non-beer drinker!Beer can become "skunked" after several months. It most certainly does not maintain a fresh flavor for years. 2-4 months, probably ok, 8-10 months its going to have an off flavor. You can still drink it, and some people won't mind, but it won't be "good" (as in pleasant) anymore.

I had to call my health insurance to try to get a new provider today, as we just moved into a new area. So she looked me up by zipcode, and said, "Okay, it looks like there's an opening at Dover." I'd never heard of a city/town named Dover near me, so I said, "Where's Dover?" Her: "You know, Dover, Delaware." Me: "Uh... DELAWARE? I'm supposed to go to DELAWARE for a doctor?" Her: <unsure> "Are you... near the border with Delaware, maybe?" Me: "<MyState> doesn't share a border with Delaware!"

It doesn't *really* fall under "an adult should really know this," (maybe more of a "the computer system should know this!") because for all I know she lives out west and how would she know how close the East Coast states are... but I thought it funny enough that I needed to post it *somewhere*. For the record, the healthcare facility that was coming up in Dover would have been at least a 4-5 hour drive to see a doctor. It did manage to come up with a second choice that was, at least, in the neighboring state, but still too far. Turned out to be a system problem and a restart fixed it.

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For the cider/apple juice/alcohol discussion,I recall a thread a few years ago about a picnic with cider and a long debate if it would be ok for kids or not. Depending on the region of the US, cider was a myriad of things!

I am serving hot apple cider at a Christmas in July party next month, without alcohol.

And once DH (then boyfriend) were accused of under aged drinking when it was only sparkling grape juice, in a pretty bottle!

Oh, that jsut reminded me--On (not yet) DH's 21st b-day, I escorted him to a liquor store to legally have him buy his first bottle of whatever. And the clerk did not ask for ID! I told the clerk that this was a rite of passage day, and if it had been just a few hours earlier, the clerk could have been breaking the law!

Now we are in our 40's, and there is only one bar that cards us, but that is for the game rentals, not the drinking.

Two things about this are that beverages aren't usually considered "canned foods" and you didn't mention cans in your post so I assumed bottles. Again I double back to the commercial advertising expiration dates on beer and talking about how the brand will help you avoid "skunky" beer, and non-beer-drinking me can easily interpret that to mean that beer has a specific shelf life that's short enough that it would be reasonable to mark it on the container.

Virg

Even then, from what I've heard, canned foods and cans of beverage are completely different as well. Canned foods are shelf-stable, but canned beer still should be kept cold or it will go off, and will go off much faster than shelf-stable canned foods.

Certainly they don't expire in 3 or 4 months (which was all the older that beer was)--that's the whole point of canning things.

That's the part that was sort of unusual for someone not to know.

(We all know or don't know some stuff.)

If he doesn't drink beer himself, he probably really didn't know. I don't!

What I do know is that generally red wines improve with aging and white wines usually do not. So I might assume that perhaps the same thing was true of beers -- that age made a difference.

Edited to add: I also, like Virg, was assuming bottles of beer, not cans. See? That's how much I know about beer!

Also, I could be wrong on this, but IIRC all of the aging on alcohol is done before it ever hits the bottle. Once it's bottled, it's more or less stable, so having it sitting around isn't going to age it any more in the bottle. The reason some of the older years have certain prestige isn't because of how much more they've aged, but because it's a very good vintage and hasn't been opened yet, and is therefore rare because most bottles of that vintage would have been consumed long ago.

For the cider/apple juice/alcohol discussion,I recall a thread a few years ago about a picnic with cider and a long debate if it would be ok for kids or not. Depending on the region of the US, cider was a myriad of things!

I am serving hot apple cider at a Christmas in July party next month, without alcohol.

And once DH (then boyfriend) were accused of under aged drinking when it was only sparkling grape juice, in a pretty bottle!

Oh, that jsut reminded me--On (not yet) DH's 21st b-day, I escorted him to a liquor store to legally have him buy his first bottle of whatever. And the clerk did not ask for ID! I told the clerk that this was a rite of passage day, and if it had been just a few hours earlier, the clerk could have been breaking the law!

Now we are in our 40's, and there is only one bar that cards us, but that is for the game rentals, not the drinking.

My SO once got carded trying to buy root beer!

(For those in other parts of the world who are unfamiliar with it, it's a completely alcohol-free carbonated soda)

My now-DH and I invited a coworker & her boyfriend over for dinner, or dessert, or something. DH was living in his parents' old home in a VERY bachelor existence; he went to their new home for dinner nearly every night.

While our guests were there, he opened the fridge and said, "I have some beer in there, but it's been there a few months--I don't know if it's still good."

Certainly they don't expire in 3 or 4 months (which was all the older that beer was)--that's the whole point of canning things.

That's the part that was sort of unusual for someone not to know.

(We all know or don't know some stuff.)

Spoken (written) like a non-beer drinker!Beer can become "skunked" after several months. It most certainly does not maintain a fresh flavor for years. 2-4 months, probably ok, 8-10 months its going to have an off flavor. You can still drink it, and some people won't mind, but it won't be "good" (as in pleasant) anymore.

Actually- there is way more than age that goes into the "skunking" of a beer. It depends on what the beer is stored in- Glass will skunk faster than a can due to the light that gets into the beer. It is actually hard to skunk a can on light alone. The bigger piece is temperature. If you cool and then bring a beer back to room temperature, the beer can get skunked. Do it repeatedly and the flavor changes more and more.

Some beers also improve with age- I have some Thomas Hardys which are over 10 years old and a few Ommegang Adorations that I have aging and when tasted with their new versions, they take on a much deeper flavor. Not that a regular "domestic" would react in the same way- altho most of those are old by the time they hit the shelf anyway. Basic thoughts in the industry now are that the cheaper the beer, the less time changes the flavor to the end consumer.

And then you have some beers that come pre skunked.... Budweiser comes to mind. The flavor that people associate with Bud is actually skunking. All that about the Oak chips is a marketing gimmick. It is indeed a process used in the brewing, but they then pay a lot of money to take the oak flavor back out of the beer, which ends up skunking it. When I used to run tastings, people would ask how my brand could taste more like Bud, and I would tell them to leave it in the sun for 15 minutes, then taste it again. They always came back saying that it did indeed taste a lot more like Bud after that. Side note, I always worried about the people who said that, enjoyed it, and then spent $10 on a 6 pack of mine to leave it in the sun to make it taste more like Bud....

Why yes, I did work in beer for a while... why do you ask?

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"He attacked everything in life with a mix of extraordinary genius and naive incompetence, and it was often difficult to tell which was which." Douglas Adams

Sorry... I can't help myself This is why none of my friends will let me go on brewery tours with them. Or beer tastings. Or brew beer... (blondie wanders off to local watering hole to find someone who can't stand to lecture about their drinks origins....)

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"He attacked everything in life with a mix of extraordinary genius and naive incompetence, and it was often difficult to tell which was which." Douglas Adams